


Flare and Fade

by fadewithfury (foxmoon)



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Angst, Episode: s04e17-e18 The End of Time, Episode: s05e01 The Eleventh Hour, F/M, Memory Loss, Regeneration, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-16
Updated: 2016-07-16
Packaged: 2018-07-24 06:49:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,742
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7498317
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/foxmoon/pseuds/fadewithfury
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What if the Tenth Doctor could not make it, and regenerated in the presence of Rose.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Flare and Fade

**Author's Note:**

> This is one of the first fics I ever wrote for the fandom. I took it down a long time ago, and I finally felt comfortable with putting it back up. It has a few minor tweaks, but I left it mostly unchanged.

The Doctor winced and braced himself against the course bricks of the alley wall. He knew Rose would walk by soon, so he had to hold it together. If only he had the nerve to just allow himself to collapse under the horror of this pain. But no. He needed to see her. _Had to._ Of course, he’d never forget the angles and curves of her, not ever in his life, but this body could not end without her voice, without her face easing it to sleep.

_Rose…_

Radiation tore through his every limb as he fought to keep the regenerative process at bay. He felt eviscerated, flayed alive, exposed to his very core. His mind reeled as its tethers to his carefully secured link to the temporal-psychic field began to unravel. Any Time Lord in the vicinity would know of his ordeal, and for once he was thankful to be on his own. This would have to be his most vulnerable, his most drawn out and excruciating regeneration yet.

Voices from around the corner roused him from the overwhelming ache. He pushed off the wall to stand as still as he could in the shadows where he had a better view of the street. He wanted to see her, but didn’t want to be seen. Shouldn’t be seen. Nevertheless, he’d give anything to see her smile at him, tongue caught in her teeth, adoring glint in her gold-laced, brown eyes.

The moment she came into view with her mother, several urges struck him at once.

The urge to rush out to her and sweep her into his arms. The urge to fall to his knees and just let himself die. How could he go on without her?

The urge to speak to her—something benign, unobtrusive to future events.

The urge to flee. _That one never went away._

He barely caught a word of their conversation as he fought against each urge, but soon realized that Rose stood alone in the pale halo of snow-glow and fairy lights. Her feet made prints in the frosted ground, conjuring a vivid memory of Victorian Cardiff, Rose with her hair swept up to expose the soft curve of her neck. The memory unfurled a wave of heartache; he clenched his teeth.

And then she moved past him, the back of her angled in his direction. He could barely see her face, even if she turned her head, and he’d wanted to see her face. Wanted to feel her glowing presence heal him to the core, and yet there she was walking away. A lovely scent, familiar and foreign, different but the same, wafted his way on the cold breeze. The scent of her, of _Rose._ All at once, he could perceive her as his current self _and_ his former, he could hear her at both frequencies, smell her, taste her, need her. It nearly slayed him. He could hold on no longer.

The Doctor flinched and choked audibly on the pain as though he’d been punched in the gut, hand flying up to brace himself on the handle of the warehouse door at his side. After a few ragged breaths, he managed to regain control, but it was too late. He’d been seen.

“You all right, mate?” Rose asked, peering into the darkness.

“Yeah,” he managed as his eyes met hers.

“Too much to drink?”

“Something like that.”  
  
The Doctor just stared at her, too in love to look away and too in pain to think of anything more meaningful to say.

“Maybe it’s time you went home,” she said carefully, still huddled up in her own arms. Errant snowflakes drifted down to land on her shoulders and in her hair.

The Doctor fought back tears with a lump in his throat. “Ye—” His response was cut short as another shockwave of pain ripped through him. His body fought to complete the natural process of regeneration to preserve his life, and he knew that if he held out too much longer the radiation would kill him. He doubled over and dropped to his knees, hands splaying open on the snowy road.

Rose rushed to his side in an instant. She bent over him, hand on his back. “Oh, God! Are you okay? Sure you’re gonna be all right?”

The Doctor broke into a cold sweat as panic set in. This was not supposed to happen; he had to get away from her, but his TARDIS was half a street away. He scrambled up to a crouch, shielding his face from her view. “I’m—I’m fine, please, just leave me. Please!”

“Are you bloody mad? I can’t just leave you like this! I’ll call an ambulance,” Rose knelt down beside him and her hand dove into her pink coat pocket.

“No! No, please. You have to listen to me,” the Doctor said through gritted teeth and grabbed her wrists, throwing caution to the wind that she may recognize him from this moment in her future. Though at the rate things were going, her future with him was on the verge of vanishing forever.  “I’m unwell, yes, but it’s very, so very important that you go inside your building right now.”

Rose stared at him, eyes wide, and then looked down to his hands. “You—you’re glowing!”

The Doctor released her swiftly. “No!”  

He’d let his guard down for just a moment and his body had regained control. The grand finale had begun. There was no turning back now. He hurriedly staggered across the street towards the TARDIS. If he could just get away long enough for this to safely carry out, he could return and remove these memories from her mind.

“Wh—where are you going?!” Rose scrambled after him, grasping his arm to help him up as he slid in the snow.

The Doctor felt defeated by her persistence. Always his Rose; the one who made him better. He let her help him as far as the TARDIS doors, and then pried himself from her steady grasp and pushed her gently away from him.

“Rose, please. Please just go!” he summoned a harshness to his tone that he hoped would scare her. He’d rather her go on thinking of him as some drunken, rude nutter on the street than for her to be _killed_. The radiation coursing through him a sure catalyst for his most destructive regeneration yet.

“Ho-how the hell do you know my name?” Rose stumbled backwards, but caught her balance swiftly. She narrowed her eyes, suspicious, though he knew her too well. That beseeching look in her eyes had always belied any outer indignation.

Either way, the Doctor didn’t answer. Simply drank in one last look before he pressed the key into the door and went inside. He grasped at the rail of the ramp along the way to the console to keep his balance. The lilting pulse of the TARDIS center column welcomed him and bathed him in a somber, green glow.

As he began flipping switches and turning dials to get himself as far away as possible from civilization, he scarce noticed that Rose had slipped inside as well, closing the door behind her.  He caught sight of her as he punched in the final coordinates and set the TARDIS on course for orbit around Earth.

The whirr and groan as his ship entered the vortex filled the air, and Rose stopped in her tracks. She stared wildly at her surroundings before her eyes settled on him.

The Doctor stared back at Rose. His hands clenched the control panel before him, knuckles white. A quick check of the monitor and other readouts confirmed that they had eased into Earth’s orbit, but he had no more time to save Rose.

“I’m so sorry…I can’t—can’t stop it.”

His entire body began to hum with energy; light flickered from his fingertips, and he felt so much better now that his battle with regeneration was over. He tensed up and flung his arms out as his back arched. The crescendo of brilliant, golden energy swept up to the surface and burst through his head and hands, and in that moment, he knew with perfect clarity, that he had destroyed things beyond hope of repair.

The remaining radiation ripped through him and was expelled from his body with the burst of regenerative power. A shockwave swept across the control room, igniting whirlwind flames and shattering roundels. A pylon cracked and collapsed, sending coral shrapnel skittering across the grated floor. Rose was thrown back from the force of the shockwave and slammed against the door.  She rolled off to the side, striking her head on the railing along the way. Sparks rained across her still form as she slipped unconscious.

The Doctor cried out as his body fully morphed, feeling each thread of DNA rewrite itself to form anew. When finally, the storm had calmed and his surroundings slid back into focus, he spun around and swayed, nearly losing his balance as explosions fired off all around him.

Disorientated, he glanced down at himself and lifted a knee.

“Legs! I’ve still got legs.” He kissed his knee. “Good.”

Checking his other appendages, he listed them off in turn. “Arms, hands. Ooh, fingers—“ and with that he wiggled them to be perfectly sure. “Lots of fingers. Ears,” he cupped them, remembering how awkward and large they had been in a previous body, then moved on. “Eyes, two. Nose. I’ve had worse.”

More explosions rocked the TARDIS as he continued his assessment. A brief concern that he might be a girl was abated when, upon further inspection, he determined that he was still a boy, thank goodness. Yet, still not ginger. Perhaps next time.

He tapped his temples as another explosion knocked him against the console. “There was something else, something important. I’m… I’m… ha! CRASHING!”

///

Rose drifted to the surface of her own mind, but could not breech the barrier no matter how hard she tried. She flitted in and out of consciousness, never quite able to lay anchor. Searing pain eclipsed any attempt to focus on her surroundings. She could only collect errant stimuli through intermittent wakefulness and came to the conclusion that she must be laying in the middle of a violent storm. Though she felt no rain, she heard muffled peals of thunder that vibrated the ground beneath her cheek. Flashes of lightning pulsed against her closed eyes. Each sensation brought with it a wave of heat and nausea and she slipped back under.

Darkness followed, until, slowly, Images wavered through her mind as though she were watching a dream underwater. She saw Mickey with the boys catching a match on the telly in her living room, which wouldn’t be upsetting if it wasn’t the fifth time in the past two weeks that he had put off their plans to do so. Anger shot through her, igniting another recent memory. She saw herself in a row with her mother, but couldn’t recall the reason for their fight. After all, they had since made up and gone out to celebrate New Year’s together.  Several other memories floated past until they swirled together and all sense was lost. The darkness came again; this time had a chance to welcome its return.

When she came around again, she managed to open her eyes.  Her surroundings glowed dim in hues of gold and copper and appeared filtered through a thick, gauzy lens. She blinked several times and pressed the heels of her hands to her eyes, hoping to dispense the blur. A plea to rest drifted through her mind, and she felt unable to resist. She heeded and lay there, slowly opening and closing her eyes and breathing steadily until her surroundings came into focus.

///

After his encounter with the human child, Amelia Pond, the Doctor rushed back into the TARDIS medical bay to check on Rose. Rose! Apples! That’s why he’d craved apples. Two things always came to mind when he thought of Rose. Two or three. Possibly more like twenty thousand, but two for starters. Dancing and applegrass.  Dancing—when, in his ninth body, he realized he had fallen for this bottle-blonde human. And lying with her in a field of applegrass—when in his tenth body, he realized how deeply he loved her.

Prior to peering outside after the crash and finding himself in Amelia’s backyard, he had found Rose lying among the ruins of the old control room. Moving her had been quite problematic. For one, the way was littered with debris and bits of fire. Secondly, he was still quite disoriented from his regeneration. At first, he completely forgot she shouldn’t even be there. Thought they had gotten into some sort of trouble. Perhaps things had gone awry while visiting the waterfall of Qelle. Yes—that had to be what happened. They had banged up the TARDIS nicely on their escape and Rose hit her head, got this massive concussion and now they’d crashed back on earth. But, wait—hadn’t he just regenerated? He had dissolved into a lengthy reenactment of their adventure for the unconscious Rose as he cleared the path, his mind and body clearly out of synch.

Incredible what the mind will conjure when reality is too brutal to bear. Even for a Time Lord. They did visit the waterfall of Qelle, but that was a long time ago. Before she slipped away towards the void…

He had hoisted Rose into his arms, seen the scarf and her golden hair, remembered her footsteps in the snow and his mistake came rushing back to the forefront of his thoughts. He had sobbed and clung to her, burrowing his face in her neck. The Doctor had inhaled the delicate floral of her shampoo; the salt on her skin… so familiar and yet so strange in this new body. He could also smell acrid singes in her clothing and her hair and a metallic tang of blood. Reverence would have to wait; she needed medical attention.

Now, as the Doctor stared down at Rose in the TARDIS medbay, she drifted in and out of consciousness. Amelia Pond was waiting outside. He had already kept her waiting five minutes; best not let a little one wait too much longer. Promises were important things to keep when it came to human children. He’d pop out and check on her, and then he’d have to get Rose back into her own timeline as soon as her injuries healed and her concussion waned.

“Where am I?” Rose groaned, blinking slowly awake.

The Doctor hooked his foot around a nearby chair and dragged it over so he could sit closer to her. “You are safe now. Had a bit of a fall, but you’re going to be just fine.” It dawned on him she’d asked something else entirely. “You’re in my ship.”

Rose’s eyes dragged up to his face and she squinted. “Who are you?”

“I’m—I’m the Doctor,” he said, blinking. Having been newly regenerated, his emotions were a little volatile, and he had a hard time swallowing the lump in his throat as he drank her in, too-dark eye makeup and all. “What do you remember?”

“I remem—“ Rose’s eyes rolled back and held her head. The Doctor waited patiently for her to overcome the wave of physical distress. She continued after swallowing.  “There was a man. He was hurt, and I followed him into this… I don’t even know how to describe it.”

“My ship,” he offered softly. “That was me. I’m all right now.”

Rose stared at him, studying his features. “Was it you? But—you look different from what I remember. Blimey, did I hit my head that hard?”

“You hit your head rather hard, yes. Or, something hit your head. Likely the regenerative shockwave; it was nasty this time. All the radiation. But, what you remember is correct. You saw a different face than what you see now, though I’m the same man.”

Rose looked around the room. “What d’you mean by ship, anyway? A space ship?”

The Doctor smiled and gave his brand new medbay a good once-over as well. “Yes, but not exactly.”

“Riiight,” Rose said with naked skepticism. “Why…how did you change your face?” She struggled to sit up.

“Please, you need to rest. You’ve a concussion.” The Doctor put his hand on her shoulder to gently urge her back down before answering. “It’s a technique my species learned as a means to prolong our lives.” It felt a little absurd to have to explain all of this to her again. And he really shouldn’t be. He really should just touch her mind and ease her back into a sleep-state until her concussion had fully healed so he could then remove these memories. Everything he said would be just one more connection he’d have to untether.  But this was Rose Tyler, and every word she spoke made him want to hear more.

“Your species? Are you alien?” Rose regarded him with intense scrutiny. “What were you doing in the alley by the Powel Estate of all places? If you’re really an alien, there’s got to be better places out there, yeah?”

The Doctor felt like laughing and sobbing at the same time. “Better places, yes, and much worse, but I was there to see a—a friend…”

Rose rolled her head to the side, her eyes drifting shut. “Think I’m having one of those dreams within a dream. Can’t be real…”

“Feel free to rest as long as you like. I’m going to go check if there are any leftover repairs to my ship. I’ll be back later to see if you’re hungry.” The Doctor stood.

Rose rolled her head back towards him and opened her eyes. “A doctor with a space ship and a ripped up suit,” she said with a matter-of-fact mumble.

The Doctor looked down at his singed tie and tattered shirt. “Quite right.” He smiled down at her, though he knew she was talking to herself. Her eyes fluttered closed once more and she began to breathe slow and steadily. The Doctor looked up, sensing that the TARDIS had a role in her swift slumber. He reached out a hand move a few strands of hair from her face, but his fingertips paused in mid-air just above her temple. It would be so easy. But, she still had residual injury from her concussion. She needed more rest. She needed to be close to him just a little bit longer. He finally made contact and gently swept the hair from her face. 

///

After poking around the controls in the console room, and receiving numerous mental zaps from the TARDIS that he should just leave well enough alone as she’s still making repairs, the Doctor headed for the door. He swung it open to a world that looked absolutely nothing like the backyard of Amelia Pond’s home. Hands slid through his hair in disbelief as he stepped outside. The TARDIS had parked on a shelf of rock overlooking a vast pool of rushing water. The water was encircled by crescent cliffs and jagged peaks of rock. He looked up over his shoulder to the pale cliffs behind him, and then on to the twilight sky that arched overhead.

“Ahh!” The Doctor yelped as he finally registered the looming presence of an enormous planet over the lip of the horizon.  Just like him to miss the obvious. Least that hadn’t changed. Though, could it be? That one continent looked awfully familiar. Were they on the moon of Qelle?  He studied the faded shapes of the continents, what he could discern beneath drifting clouds, at least, and nodded. They had, indeed, landed on the moon of Qelle. The TARDIS likely heard an echo of his earlier thoughts during a pivotal moment in her repair processes and the coordinates were locked. He stared out over his surroundings, wondering if he’d been the only person to ever see it from this vantage point. Nothing grew here, unless one counted crystals. Loads of crystals. He walked to the edge of the rock shelf and sat down, slinging his legs over the side.

As he sat, he let the sound of rushing water overtake his senses. He still felt out of sorts, and swayed before coughing up a bit of residual regeneration energy. He watched the motes of green-tinged, golden dust drift off on currents of air. A scuff of shoe on stone drew his attention from the dissipating energy and he looked up to see Rose standing there, representing a perfect embodiment of awe.

“Welcome to the Moon of Qelle. I think we’re the first life forms to set foot here. I’ve been tempted, but never seemed to get around to it,” said the Doctor, waving a hand at the view.

“We’re on a moon with a waterfall? I know I’m dreaming,” Rose said, breathless. She stared across at the planet, Qelle. “How else would I be able to breathe out here?”

“This is all real,” said the Doctor. “And the TARDIS has extended her force field so we can breathe. Come and sit. I’ll tell you all about it—that way, even if this is a dream, you’ll have a lot of interesting things to talk to your friends about come tomorrow.”

Rose drifted over to him without looking, her eyes fixed on Qelle. She stumbled a little, and he held up his hand to take hers and guide her down to sit next to him. She crossed her legs and simply stared, and the Doctor couldn’t take his eyes off of her.

“All right then, tell me.  Is this another galaxy?” Rose looked over at him and caught him staring.

“No, still what you call the Milky Way. Not too far from Earth, mind. Though, much farther than humans will travel for quite some time. “

“What’s that planet called?” Rose continued to stare at it, and he could sense how captured she felt by her own insignificance in relation to something so incredible. 

“That is Qelle. Beautiful planet with a post-technological society. The largest culture is an empire that surrounds the ocean in which this moon’s waterfall pours. They worship the moon and the waterfall; or, more accurately, believe their pantheon of deities lives up here and the waterfall is the conduit for their communion.  They once traveled space but since returned to their homeworld and now shun nonessential technology and tend to forbid outsiders. Especially if all you’re here for is to gawk at their moon.  They get quite testy, but how could one not gawk? It’s a giant waterfall that pours from moon to planet. One of the rarest phenomena in the universe. I suspect it’s caused by folded space. Too bad my ship is preoccupied with repairs or I’d have her do a few readings.”

Several animated gestures and near-full-body reenactments later, the Doctor soon realized that Rose was staring at him, searching his eyes. The Doctor saw confusion, frustration, and skepticism in the crease of her brow, the tilt of her head and the squint of her eyes. But what he loved best of all was when it all fell away to be replaced by acceptance. Not understanding—no, this was far over her head. Right now, at any rate. She had a ways to go before she’d become the strong-minded, dimension-hopping Rose he left with his Metacrisis in the other dimension (willed his mind not to even pause there). He knew she’d accepted the possibility of his words in the way she turned her gaze thoughtfully over the flowing pool of water.

 Rose’s tongue ran across her lips and she exhaled. “Is this where you’re from? If you’re an alien…”

“No,” the Doctor said simply. He didn’t want to get into it all; best not to fill her head with too many loose ends to tie up. Why he chose now to close off, he wasn’t sure (could be that ever intrusive vision of his metacrisis kissing her). He wanted to tell her everything. Open to her. Unfold for her like a map and let her slide her fingertips across every line and angle as she explored his world. It was difficult to have Rose right there next to him and not grab her hand and pull her along with him to see all of the places he didn’t get a chance to show her and tell her everything  she’d ever want to know. Whatever it’d take to keep her there forever. But every moment that passed, was a moment closer to when he’d have to claim these memories from her mind.

“It’s hard to believe, but I’m seeing it. This moon can’t be round, can it? Seems like a floating island more like, yeah?” Rose looked over at him.

It took him a moment to find his voice. “Oh, it’s irregular, yes.” He cleared his throat to remove the rasp. “More like an asteroid. It remains in perfect orbital synch with Qelle so the waterfall  doesn’t move. Falls into the ocean, always.” The Doctor slid his hand along the cool, smooth surface of the rock shelf on which they sat. He found a small shard of crystal and picked it up, turning it over in his hand.

“S’a crystal,” Rose said. “How do they get up here?”

“Crystals form by nucleation; and tend to form when molten rock cools very rapidly, or when water evaporates,” he brought the crystal to his nose, and almost licked it, but surprised himself by not. Must be another difference for this new body. “There is a weak atmosphere here, and it’s probably just from Qelle, but I’d wager that we might find there are two competing atmospheres on account of the folded space.”

“Are you a scientist?”

“Something like that, yes.”

“Well, which is it? A doctor or a scientist?” Rose grinned at him, bumping his shoulder.

The Doctor laughed. “I’m both, a bit. I’m a lot of things. Brilliant, actually.”

Her smile widened, then twisted into more of a smirk, and he let it wash over him, even as she rolled her eyes. He’d take it. Any Rose smile would do, so long as she smiled at him. He took her hand and placed the crystal in her palm. “Feel it.”

Rose closed her hand around the crystal. “It’s cold. Kinda vibrates.”

“Yes. Appears to be attuned to a slightly different frequency than us, like its molecules originate in another dimension, or another universe. Kind of puts a kink in my folded space theory, but perhaps not. Toss it into the water; see what happens. It might explode. The TARDIS shields will protect us if that happens, so not to worry.”

“You’re joking, right? It could explode? I’m not gonna do that! What if we fall from the sky and all those people down there get crushed!” Rose sets the crystal down on the shelf beside her and slides it away carefully.

“You’re right, that was a rubbish idea,” the Doctor says as he pouts inside. He mentally waves off the urge to do it himself, deciding that he’d much rather bask in Rose’s compassion than her fury right now. “How’s your head?”

“Feels a lot better, thanks.”

The Doctor leans a bit so he can look into her eyes and check her pupil dilation. “You may have headaches for the next few days, but it seems to be a mild concussion. The cut on your head looked nastier than it was. That’s all healed now.”

“Futuristic medicine, yeah?”

“Exactly, but not really. It’s ancient technology. Futuristic for you.”

“Ah, so I’m primitive. Well then,” Rose said with a playful huff.

The Doctor grinned. “Yes, but you’re brilliant.” His smile faded. “So brilliant and lovely. And I’m so sorry…”

Rose peered up at him, her brow furrowed. “Wha—“

The Doctor lifted his hands and pressed his fingertips along her temples and the sides of her head.

“What are you doing?” Rose flinched as he touched her.

The Doctor could taste her adrenaline on the air as she became afraid of what he’d do to her. “I’m not going to hurt you.” He added, and eventually her eyes drifted closed as he pressed upon her mind and began closing doors.

 

///

The Doctor struggled with landing the TARDIS in Rose’s room.  His ship really needed to rest and finish rebuilding, but this simply had to be done.  First, she appeared facing the window, and so he had to turn her around, only to finally stumble out on a pile of laundry. After swatting a bra off of his shoulder—really didn’t want to think much about that right now—he waited quietly to ensure Jackie hadn’t awoken from all of the commotion. Silence. Either she wasn’t here, or she was a dead sleeper. Either way, he felt comfortable with moving on to the next step.

Just inside, lying across the jump seat was a deeply sleeping Rose. He picked her up and just stood there in the console room, staring up at the green glow of the central column.  The TARDIS did her best to soothe his troubled mind, though her attempts were unfocused. _That’s all right, old girl. Just concentrate on yourself right now._

He closed his eyes, memorizing the weight of her in his arms. The smell of her skin. The sound of her gentle breathing.  It almost broke him. Vestiges of his two former selves clawed at the membrane between them and his current regeneration, desperate for control.  But he had to shake them off; they were gone. Replaced by—by whoever he was now. An unknown Time Lord in raggedy trousers and a singed tie with a litany of personalities tucked away inside of his brain. He imagined that each time he regenerated, it was like dipping his hands into a stream where flowed a mixture of the men he used to be, and pouring it into his skull, where, with the catalyst of his first experiences in his new body, he would be reborn.  Introspection soon invaded the other hundred or so different things his brain was processing concurrently. Temperature. Humidity. Chemical compounds within Rose’s room. Timelines weaving about from people known and unknown. Calculations. Trajectories. Murmurs of psychic potential in humans in the vicinity.

With a heavy sigh, he pushed the crowd of thoughts from his mind so he could focus every synapse on these last few moments with Rose. He carried her from the control room to her bed, sliding her beneath the fluffy pink blankets. Not once did she stir, and he was thankful for that. It meant his delving in her mind had been successful, despite his newly regenerated state. He stood over her and watched her sleep for a moment, wholly unable to move. The room seemed to expand around him, or he felt like shrinking. Either way, time was both boundless and finite in this one moment. This would be the last time he’d ever see her. Ever.

“You’ll be with me forever. Just like you said. Maybe not how you wanted to be, but as long as I’m alive, so will you be.” The Doctor ran his hands through his hair, wanting to say more. Wanting to hold her, but knowing he had to go as the TARDIS groaned behind him. “Goodbye.” He bent over and kissed her forehead.  Faltering as he opened the TARDIS door, he turned back to her, opened his mouth to say something else. An expression of love—but it wouldn’t come. Even now. Perhaps that was best.

The Doctor then slipped back into the TARDIS and out of her life so that he could make sure he’d be in it in the first place.

///

Rose awoke slowly, regrettably. She felt warm and so safe and didn’t want to ever leave his embrace. The Doctor held her against his chest, and she felt totally at peace drifting in a cocoon of brown pinstripes.  His quadruple heartbeat should have made her anxious, as her heart had often tried to match what it interpreted as a rapid rhythm. But—instead, it had become synonymous with joy, so she could only relax to its cadence.  She wiggled, snuggling closer to him as her lips curled into a smile. She felt his fingers sweep through her hair and she sighed.

The night before, the Doctor had come into her room, claiming to sense that she was having a rough time falling asleep. They had been through a lot lately: Krop Tor facing a devil and near death. Rose had been trapped by the Wire and the Doctor had been trapped in a drawing. Seemed the universe was determined to keep them apart.

She had fallen asleep in his arms as soon as they enveloped her, and he clearly had made no attempts to leave.  She nuzzled against the scratchy material of his suit, breathing in his scent. His hand found its way through her hair to the nape of her neck, and she whimpered as he stroked her sensitive skin. Emboldened by this seemingly clear show of affection, she arched against him slid her palm over his stomach, fingertips toying with a button on his suit jacket. 

“You’re awake,” he said, his hand going still.

Rose’s entire body tingled as his voice vibrated in his chest, but her hand went still in echo of his. “I—yes, but you…” She swallowed, heart hammering. “You don’t have to stop. S’nice…”

“You seemed to sleep peacefully.” The Doctor said, untangling his hand from her hair.

Rose nearly wept at the loss of his hand, and she wondered what had tempted him to touch her like that in the first place if he was so keen to stop. “I think so. Better than I’ve slept in a long time. I had a dream we were on a moon with a waterfall,” Rose said, her voice groggy.

“Why were we there?” asked the Doctor. He put his other hand over her hand that was resting on his stomach and slid his fingers between hers.

 “I don’t know.” Perplexed, Rose watched him entwine his hand with hers. “But it was beautiful. The waterfall was huge, and it fell from the moon to the planet below. Mad, isn’t it?”

“ _You’re_ mad. Or brilliant. I can’t decide,” the Doctor said as he lifted her hand.

Rose propped up on her elbow and furrowed her brow. She expected that he was in the process of removing her hand from touching him, and felt as though she’d been dunked in a pool of ice water.  She scanned his expression for any hint of distaste at her closeness. “What? Why?”

“Oh, nothing. It’s just—there really is a planet like that. Qelle, it’s called. Has a moon that is more or less a low-orbiting meteor. Waterfall flows right from that moon down to the planet’s largest ocean. You haven’t heard of it? Just dreamed of it out of the blue like that?” He tugged at her hand as he spoke, pulling her arm the rest of the way across his torso. He let go of her hand and wrapped his arms around her in a breath-squelching hug.

The air rushed out of Rose’s lungs as he squeezed her, and she grinned, entwining her arms around him as best as she could with him lying on his back.

“I’ll take you there. What do you say?” He loosened his grip, but kept his arms around her.

“Ready when you are.” Rose relaxed against him once more and lifted her head to look at his face. She found her lips just centimeters from his chin. He was smiling with his eyes closed, hair an exquisite mess. Rose leaned in, drawn to touch him by some force more powerful than her own will, and her lips brushed briefly against the line of his jaw. She pretended that it was an accident and shifted, eyes wide as she surveyed his reaction. His smile had faded, but his eyes remained closed. A little worry line appeared between his brows and she felt a hand slide up her arm to cradle the back of her head. She bit her lip as his eyes opened.

“Hello,” he said, his gaze searching hers.

“Hello.” Rose’s voice came out as a whisper. If the room wasn’t so quiet, she’d wonder if she made any sound at all. The sorrow in his eyes unnerved her, reminded her of her dream. She hadn’t been able to see his face, but she knew it was him. A very sad him.

“Tell me more about your dream,” the Doctor said, his voice softer as his hand slid around to touch her face.

Rose swallowed and her eyes drifted closed at his touch.  Whenever he wanted to stop torturing her like this would be nice.  As her eyes opened again, she brought a hand up to toy with the knot of his tie. More than once, accidentally on purpose, she let her fingers graze against the cool skin of his neck. “That’s all I can remember, really.”

The Doctor’s eyes narrowed slightly, and Rose suspected he knew that she was lying.  His thumb brushed across her cheek and she felt her heart would burst with love for him. But then his hand was gone. The arm that had been around her back drifted away as well, though his eyes remained fixed on hers, dark and wanting. “Rose, I should get to the console room.”

“Sudden urge to repair something?” Her tone was cheeky, but she had to know the true nature of his withdrawal. He could caress her face, run his fingers through her hair, but the moment she began returning his touches, he’d stall and mutter some excuse to leave.

“Always.” And he smiled at her, that infectious, disarming, infuriating smile.

Rose rolled her eyes, but let her fingers slide from his tie to his neck, up his face and through his hair. “Did you sleep?” She dragged her nails over and behind his ear “Do you dream?”

The Doctor’s smile slowly fell away, but he never once took his eyes off of her. “No. Yes.”

Rose barely registered that he had answered her. The feel of his hair sliding between her fingers was too pleasant and required her complete attention. She let her fingernails continue to graze across his scalp when he didn’t stop her, though she paused briefly to look down at him.

His eyes were now closed, and all of the worry lines had fled from his face. Rose smiled and pulled her hand away, deciding a little turnabout was fair play. “I’ve wanted to do that for a very long time.”

The Doctor actually whined. “Didn’t have to stop.”

“So, you liked it, did you?”

“Mmm,” was all he said, eyes still closed.

Rose leaned in close. “Thought you had to do some repairs?”

“No. I just left the TARDIS drifting in the vortex all night after nudging her in the direction of home. So, we may or may not be about to land on Pangaea—or the sixty-fourth century. Can never be sure. Well, you can, if you’re paying attention. Which I haven’t been, as I’ve been here. I’ll have to check before we land.” The Doctor opened his eyes.

“Don’t really care.” Rose said with a wide grin. “We could park and peek outside first?”

The Doctor returned her smile. “I like the way you think.”

///

After parking, the Doctor and Rose stepped outside to a sunset-filled sky and cracked stone beneath their feet.  Tall spires of rock rose from still pools of water and stretched up across the brilliant pink and gold sky. Sunlight flared around the stone spires, making Rose shield her eyes. The Doctor walked up beside her and they both watched in silence as silhouettes of stingray-like creatures wheeled and drifted through the sky.

“Doesn’t seem like earth,” Rose whispered, not wanting to disturb the creatures.

“This isn’t earth. We went a bit past it, I’m afraid. Lovely, though.” The Doctor also kept his eyes on the creatures, though he hadn’t bothered to whisper.

Rose nodded and fell back into silence. Several minutes passed before one of them finally spoke.

“How long are you going to stay with me?” the Doctor asked, and looked over at her.

“Forever,” said Rose. She meant it.

The Doctor smiled.


End file.
